Run
by an obsession too far
Summary: Lily loved staying with her dad, she was always allowed to go out. but tonight, she will come across someone she didnt expect. foreshadowing of JamesLily. might be some hints of SiriusRemus. no SiriusLily sorry, but they are the main characters here.
1. Chapter 1

Lily loved visiting her dad in London. Not only did she get a break from Petunia, and got on with her dad better than almost anyone, but also got on very well with his wife Nina, and her daughter Alex, who, funnily enough, used to be Lily's friend when they were at Greencole Primary together.

In fact, it was Alex she was out with tonight. It was Alex's 16th birthday, and they decided to have a night out on the town (Alex seemed to know loads of places that didn't ID). They had spent the last few hours in a pub/bar place, and, finally, at 3 o'clock, decided to head home.

Deciding to take the short route, Alex led the way through the back alley towards their street. Ignoring Lily's protests, she grabbed her hand and pulled her through it. Just as Lily was about to say something about how dark alleyways in London weren't the safest of places, she noticed something to stop her train of thought dead. A man, _two _men...both seemingly kicking a lump on the ground. Then it hit Lily, _that was a person_. She did the first thing that came to mind, pulling Alex forward, she shouted,

"HEY"

Both the men turned, only noticing the girls at that point. As Lily grabbed for her wand, the elder of the men grabbed the other, pulling him around the corner. There was a loud 'Crack' which Lily immediately recognised as someone apperating. Giving up on the two men, whom she knew she had no chance in finding, she bent down next to the body on the floor. After checking he was breathing-she figured they were male by the way they looked-she started to check for injuries. Deciding to start with his face, she moved his hair aside. At that moment, she found out who this boy was.

Sirius Black.


	2. Chapter 2

"Alex" Lily shouted, trying to get her attention, "Help me with him, we need to get him to dad's…check he's ok…"

"Sure Lils" Alex replied, taking one of Sirius arms and placing it around her shoulder, and Lily did the same. Thinking back, Lily was never able to remember quite how they managed to get Sirius back to her fathers' house, which was still a few streets away. Getting to the house, Lily rang the bell, her hands preoccupied with holding an unconscious Sirius Black upright.

Her father answered the door, with a quizzical look on his face, "Lily? Alex? Who's this?"

"Not now Dad" Lily replied, moving forwards into the hall, "We need to get him sat down, I'll explain in a sec. Just, not now." Her father, knowing when not to mess with Lily, moved aside and let her pass into the living room, where Sirius was deposited on the sofa.

"Alex, honey, can you get me some water please?" Lily's father asked. After all, he was a doctor, and he knew what he was doing. "We should wake him up, and check for ID"

"Yeah, and no need" Lily replied, without looking at him. She immediately started to tap his face, trying to get a response, "Sirius, Sirius? Can you hear me? Wake up you big loaf!" Sirius started to stir.

"LILY!"

"What? It woke him up?" Lily said, with a smile playing at her lips, torn between worry, and amusement.

Sirius was mumbling now…

"James? Mrs Potter?"

"No, it's not any of them…" Lily's dad replied, not knowing who any of these people were.

"Father? Sir? I'm sorry! Sir. I meant Sir…" Sirius was saying frantically.

"No! No Sirius it's not your father. It's Lily, Lily Evans. You know from Hogwarts." Ignoring the quizzical look from her father at what she was saying to the boy she carried on, "You remember, we're both in Griffindor. Come on, wake up. Look at me." When that failed she thought of something else she could try, "Look at me…we have hot chocolate? No? Fine, open your eyes and look at me or I'll slap you!"

"LILY! Don't talk to someone like tha-" But he stopped short. Sirius' eyes had snapped open, and Alex was laughing like crazy, having come out of the kitchen with a glass full of water.

"That's better, now, dad's gonna take care of you. I have to go do something." With a meaningful look to her father she headed upstairs, into her bedroom, and got out a quill and some parchment, and began to write.

_James,_


	3. Chapter 3

if I owned Harry Potter, i wouldnt be here...

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James Potter was lying on his bed, bored out of his skull. It was a few weeks into the summer holidays, and he was already bored, he thought angrily. This wasn't supposed to happen, but it was.

The reason James was bored you see, was because he was being neglected (in his words) by his friends, all of whom were being very ridiculous not entertaining their friend, and, of course, it was all their fault. Well, maybe not in Remus' case, as it _had_ been the full moon only yesterday, and of course Sirius couldn't help his boredom...his parents would kill him if they found out Sirius was talking to a blood traitor whilst in their house. So it was only really Peter...who had been told many times to stay away from him and Sirius (they were very bad influences)...so it wasn't really any of their faults that he was stuck in a big house all by himself with nothing to do.

Just when he had resigned himself to his horribly boring fate, he heard a noise at the window...

_Tap tap tap..._ looking around confused for the source of the noise..._tap tap tap...tap tap tap..._he finally located the sound at the window. A beautiful Barn Owl he had never seen before. Hurrying over to the window, James opened it up, and took the letter from to owl's leg. Tearing it open, he began to read,

_James, _(he immediately recognised Lily's handwriting)

_I know this is strange, and believe me, if I didn't think it necessary, I wouldn't be writing to you, but you are the only person I could think of. Well, the thing is Sirius. He needs help. Long story short, me and my step-sister found him being beaten up in a street. We've taken him back to our house, but I he can't really stay here and I thought that you two are close, and he seemed to be scared of someone, I think it was his dad, but I'm not sure. I was wondering if you could come and get him, my address is 17 Perridew Way, London. _

_Come quickly, _

_Lily Evans_

Of course, James was up on his feet and down the stairs as soon as he had read about Sirius being beaten up, and he didn't really read the rest of the letter until he was out of the house and had summoned the Knight Bus, seen as he didn't really know where to go.

After slipping the conductor several Galleons to jump to the top of the queue (queue jumping horrible I know), he couldn't sit down. Finally, his stop arrived; he leapt from the bus, onto the street, trying to find the correct number...

* * *

Another short chapter sorry, but the next one should be up soonish i hope...well, anyway...that nice button. just down there...you can see it. press it. go on. you know you want to... 


	4. Chapter 4

James Potter stormed up the road, his gaze almost constantly shifting from the house numbers to the crumpled piece of paper held in his hand. Finally, half way down the road, he found the house he needed to, number 17.

Leaping the fence (opening it took up too much time) he practically ran up the path, donned on either side by the flowers so commonly loved by muggle housewives. Raising his fist to the door he suddenly realised how rude it would seem to hammer on someone's door if he had the wrong house, as he was sure no one would know there was a reason for him doing so. So, instead, he knocked politely, and settled for bouncing on his feet, willing the residents of the house to open the door.

Finally, after moments of waiting which seemed like an eternity, he could hear voices coming towards the door, complaining about the callers at this time of night. His heart was pounding in his chest, hoping with every fibre of his being that he was in the right place, and that his best friend was all right.

James heard the door click open, and a face appeared peering through the gap, a face he did not recognise. Fear jumped into his chest, as he tried to speak. Finally his words came to him.

"Do- does Lily live here? Lily Evans?" He asked, trying hard to stop his voice from quavering.

"Umm…yeah, hold on…" The girl replied, turning around to face back into the house, "Lils, it's for you" she shouted. Lily didn't even bother to reply, she just ran to the door, yanked it open, and let out a huge sigh of relief,

"Thank Merlin! He's through here, follow me…" She managed to stutter out, before she turned and led James through the hall to a room on their left. Immediately upon entering, James knew that Sirius was in a bad way, worse off than ever. He was hunched over, obviously pale, and very, very thin. Just as James found his voice again, and was about to speak, someone else came into the room, an older man, carrying a glass of water.

"So this is the boy's brother then?" Everyone could tell this was the wrong thing to say straight away, from the reaction of the thin boy.

"No, no…" He muttered, going rigid with fear, and staring at the older man, "No, he can't be here, please, make him go, please," The rest of the words were lost as Sirius started to shake with a mixture of silent sobs and fear. Glaring at the man, whom James could only assume was Lily's father, he was across the room in an instant, dropping to his knees and pulling his best friend into a hug,

"He's not here mate, it's ok, it's me, Prongs, I'm here, it'll all be ok now…" Murmering his comforts, James became quite oblivious to the world around him and Sirius, therefore, not noticing the hush in the room, then the whispered conversation going on between Lily and her father,

"I thought you said he was his brother…" Richard Evans said in s slightly disapproving tone,

"Well, technically, if you think about it to do with blood, he's, well, not. But everyone at Hogwarts knows that, well, their best friends. _More_ than best friends really, sort of, like brothers, even though their not related…the sort of risk their lives to save each other kind of people. All the Marauders are…but yeah…and anyway, you saw how he reacted when he thought Regulus was here."

"I suppose so, but we really should inform his parents or someone." This, however, awoke the two boys to the world around them. Sirius, who had been calming down, was immediately alert, and obviously (to those who knew him before this encounter) scared, James, on the other hand, took charge of the situation,

"NO!" He shouted before remembering his place, "no, don't tell them. He can come back to mine, my parents will be home tomorrow morning, he'll be staying with us now." Sirius' hand twitched in James', making James look into his eyes, "You're not going back there. No way. We'll send someone round to get your things…a Pureblood to be safe…"

"They won't hurt them…" Sirius spoke, very quietly, his voice croaky with misuse, "Not now, they won't want to be insulted by the ministry"

"Right, but that reminds me…" James tailed off, "umm…well…what have they…_done _this time? St Mungo's? But you don't have to go." He added quickly in response to his best friends reaction.

"No, not Mungo's I don't think anyway…it was the usual stuff…basement…no letters…_cruciatus curse_" He added bitterly, and a gasp was heard from Lily across the room. The other residents just looked bewildered.

"But, but that's illegal!" she said, so disgusted that it was almost inaudible.

"No shit Sherlock" Sirius replied snideishly (ssh it's a word now).

"Hey, stop being a git!" James replied immediately, "and anyway, who's Sherlock?"

"I dunno…Moony said it to me once, when I…" Sirius donned a lopsided grin at this point,

"DON'T NEED TO KNOW!" James replied very loudly, but grinning also, hitting Sirius on the back. And of course, being best friends like they were, noticed the wince the smaller boy attempted to hide. "What did they do? Sirius?" his voice was quiet, almost a whisper, tears were coming to his eyes, he could feel it. They had scarred Sirius emotionally, but they had never physically hurt him, and certainly never done both.

Sirius looked his best friend in his eyes, then started to remove his shirt, slipping it off his shoulders, he turned around, showing James and the others his back, which was covered in semi-healed cuts.

"How'd this happen? Sirius?"

"It seems that Snape has been teaching dear Regulus some tricks." Sirius replied, bitterness showing through in his voice.

Lily was getting paler by the second, "Severus?" She asked in a whisper to no one in particular, hardly daring to believe her ears,

"Severus Snape?" asked her father, "As in the boy who lived down Spinners End?"

Lily nodded slowly, a single tear running down her cheek.


	5. Chapter 5

Sorry about the long delay, anyone who cares, but my college work is taking up a lot of my time...but i hope, now that ive settled in a bit, that i'll be able to post on all my stories more often. Thanks.

* * *

Lily was speechless. She knew Severus was slightly inclined to the Dark Arts. Hell, he was friends with _that lot_. But she didn't know he would go this far. The curse, what ever it was, was obviously very harmful. She couldn't quite accept that Snape had taught it to others. Well, she could hardly accept that he knew it at all.

She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. He couldn't have done it. Sirius is lying. They hate Severus, of course he is. But deep down, deep down she knew he was capable of it. And it tore her up inside that he could do it. That he would do it.

Pulling herself out of her thoughts, she tried to focus. Both to figure out what had happened in the time she had been thinking to herself, and to stop herself crying. There would be time for that later. When Potter wasn't here.

Focusing on what was going on in the room, Lily noticed the look in James' eye. She couldn't quite pin point what it was exactly, something of a mixture of grief, respect, and pure loathing. Whether for Severus or Sirius' family Lily wasn't sure, but she sure as hell was glad neither of them were there.

Just then, James took a breath, and began to speak. His voice was quiet and shaky, trying to control his emotions for his friend's sake, "So, you," He took another breath, trying to calm himself, "you didn't get anything out apart from your wand?"

Sirius shook his head in reply. His personality seemed to have crumbled with his taking off his shirt. It was then, in that one moment, when Lily saw tear building in the boys grey eyes, when she saw into his soul, when she could see the emotion, the fear, the hatred, the love for his friends. Only then did she realise it all was a pretence. Only then did she realise that this boy, joker of Hogwarts, was afraid and frail and not self-confident and exuberant as everyone believed. Sure, it was part of his personality. But just then she realised, there was much more to this boy. So many shades of grey appeared in that one look he gave to James, that she suddenly understood. She had been wrong about them. Yes, they were arrogant bully's, but maybe they did have a reason for their total dislike for most, if not all, Slytherins.

Later on in the year, looking back, she wasn't sure this was a good revelation. Sure, it helped her realise that there were reasons for everything. Reasons why people did everything. But it made it so much harder for her to stick by Severus when they started to bully him, remembering the exact reason why Sirius had no shirt on. The reason why she had to summon James Potter to her house. The fear and concern in his eyes for his friend. But then again, even later, she would think that it was this that helped her move on away from her childish beliefs that people acted as they did because it was fun, or made them popular. And, after a while, she would come to realise that this day was the first day she saw the real James Potter. The first day she began the slow journey to falling in love with him.

James nodded his head briskly. "Right. Well, like I said, we'll get someone to grab your stuff. Anything they don't give back we'll buy. Merlin knows we have enough." A small smile played at Sirius' lips at this line, but it was soon to disappear, "And I think we're going to have to get someone to check out your back. No, not going to St Mungo's" he added at Sirius' reaction, "No, we'll get an independent healer, or someone from Mungo's to come up. They'll make sure you don't have any infections."

That moment seemed to be too much for the grey-eyed boy. He looked up into the hazel eyes of his best friend, and hugged him. Putting all the emotion he could into that one hug, Sirius began to weep. James, being slightly used to these outbursts of emotion, just returned the gesture, and allowed Sirius to release all the emotion of the past few weeks.


	6. Chapter 6

Lily couldn't understand it at all. This boy, always seemingly upbeat, was breaking down. The Marauders. Always so cool, playing pranks, passing classes without a moment's thought, yet here were the two leaders, held in an emotional embrace. The intimacy of the moment made Lily sure that no one apart from the Marauders themselves had seen these displays, that it was something private, something _secret_. It made Lily uncomfortable, like she was spying in on an extremely private moment between brothers, in their own home, not a moment of friends in hers. Yet it begged her to think, 'this was a secret, no one knew'. It was an amazing idea to her, who had always been insistent on hating the Marauders (except from Remus), to believe that they would not be able to keep a secret for ten seconds, let alone any longer, yet what she was seeing here was most defiantly a secret, and one which they had seemed to have been keeping for a while. This, inevitably, begged the question, 'How many more?? How many more secrets are they holding? which everyone thought they knew?'

But there was no way to know. Not then. And she could not ask, it was too personal, and no one would be willing to disturb the scene before them. For it seemed it was needed by the boy desperately, as he clung to his friend, releasing all the pent up emotions, letting them spill over. And spill over they did, for more than five minutes the boys hugged, just aware of each other, and nothing else, until, at last, they broke free of each other's embrace.

Lily, tearing her eyes away from the scene in front of her, looked around the room at her family. All were looking slightly surprised, though less so than Lily, but then, she supposed, they did not know the boys, nor even know of them before that night.

But there was silence now. An awkward silence at that. James and Sirius both looked thoroughly embarrassed at what had happened, and the way that everyone was staring at them, though it was at this point that Lily realised the look on her father's face. Needing to talk to him, she pulled the only pretence she could think of.

"Anyone want something to drink?"

Only after she said it, did she realise how silly it sounded after the emotional display. However, this did seem to be greatly appreciated by both the boys, who started laughing almost immediately. Lily's father, sensing her meaning, quickly followed suit,

"Yes! A drink would be lovely! I'll have a tea, but what about you boys? Tea? Coffee? Water? Or maybe something stronger? I've got some cider in the fridge or even some"

He stopped talking there, noticing the looks on their faces, confused as to why, he turned to Lily, who was giggling to herself. Taking pity on her father, she began to explain,

"They don't know what cider is dad. We don't have it in Hogwarts, we have stuff like butterbeer and firewhiskey"

"OH" he suddenly understood, "well, we still have tea, you do drink tea right? And coffee?"

"Yeah, we do." James replied, smiling that at least one thing was the same in both worlds, they all had tea, "I think we will have a tea each if that's ok? I have mine with milk, one sugar, and Pads here has milk three sugars"

"great, we'll just get them" Lily said, dragging her dad into the kitchen,

"So what's their story?" Richard enquired,

"I'm not sure. They're best friends, do everything together, well, almost. Occasionally you see James without Sirius, but that's usually if Sirius is with Remus and they want to be alone..." Lily babbled on for a while before realising the lost look her father had donned, "What?"

"I'm lost, go back. Now who's Remus?"

"OH! Right, of course you don't know! Remus is Sirius' boyfriend" Lily replied, matter-of-factly.

"oh, ok. What about that wound though, on the boys, Sirius's, back? I'm a doctor, I could help, clear it up, stich it. If he wants to come to the hospital..."

"Thanks dad," Lily replied lovingly, "But you wouldn't be able to do anything, number one, Sirius doesn't want to go to our hospital, I don't know why, but he doesn't, and I don't think he will want to go to a muggle one either, and number two, nothing would work. That wound is from-" She could hardly speak for thinking about it. Loading the drinks onto a tray she tried again, "That wound is from a curse. A horrible one. It won't be able to heal without magic. But anyway, let's get these into the other room, come on"

Lily led the way back into the room of all the drama.


	7. Chapter 7

Hey everyone! sorry about the long wait, but ive had exams, which are really annoying and take all of my time!

James shifted in his seat as Lily and her father re-entered the living room, a smile still on his face as he recounted the highly amusing tale from their third year when they had convinced Peter to place his head between the railings near the Shrieking S

James shifted in his seat as Lily and her father re-entered the living room, a smile still on his face as he recounted the highly amusing tale from their third year when they had convinced Peter to place his head between the railings near the Shrieking Shack.

"So his head was completely jammed in there, and we couldn't get it out…" James said with a grin on his face. Lily smiled at the recollection, it truly had been funny. "so we were getting really worried, because we couldn't just go get a teacher, because we were already in so much trouble from a prank the day before. So we were just about to resort to pulling the bars apart when your sister turns up."

"So she helped him out in her good hearted way?" Alex asked knowingly.

"No, I spent the best part of half an hour telling these two what prats they are and how they should be nicer to their friends. And to be fair, they did deserve it." Lily added admonishingly, though grinning all the same as she handed James a drink.

"Hey!" Sirius said looking at Lily, "it wasn't not our fault! We didn't know his head would be that big. I mean, you'd expect it from Remus, with all he knows, and James, as Ms Evans points out regularly." Lily bowed with a little laugh at this last comment, whilst James glared daggers at Sirius.

"Yeah, well, we all know you wouldn't have been able to even put your head IN the bars, in case it messed up your precious hair"

Almost all present seemed to be totally perplexed with this exchange of course, well, with three exceptions. Nina walked forwards towards Lily and whispered something in her ear, who simply laughed. Noticing this exchange, James turned to Sirius, "It's times like these when you need Moony around." Sirius laughed, Alex looked confused.

"What do you…" she trailed off confused, deciding it wouldn't hurt to tell her, Sirius straightened up,

"Our friend, he's got a…problem. They discovered it when he was a kid. It means he gets ill a lot, and I mean A LOT! But it also means he has an extremely fantastic sense of hearing. Which is great for us, when we need to hear if people are coming that is." He added with a wink to Lily, who simply rolled her eyes and continued her hushed discussion with her father and his wife.

James sipped his drink and looked over at Sirius. He was starting to get his colour back, and his smile was growing ever clearer. Deciding he should probably talk to Lily's father about when they should leave he stood and made his way over there.

Stopping beside Lily, James smiled to her father, and, rather astoundingly, he smiled back. James, rather startled that an Evans could be smiling at him, attempted to regain his composure. Something which must have looked rather amusing, as Lily erupted in giggles, and had to move away from her father before her drink came out of her nose.

Shaking his head, James turned again to Mr Evans, "I'd like to thank you, sir, for looking after Sirius. And letting us stay here for now"

"That's perfectly alright." Richard said, "After what he's been through, it's perfectly alright. You two can stay as long as you want you know, even the night if needs be."

"Ah, thanks so much, but don't worry. Pads-I mean Sirius should be able to leave in an hour at most. Once he's recovered some of his strength."

"Are you sure?" Richard asked worridly, "if you want to stay the night you can. I can drive you back home tomorrow. Where do you live?"

"That won't be necessary, really Mr Evans, but thank you. We wouldn't want to put you out…"

"Oh, it wouldn't. You got here quite fast, so you can't live that far away right? So, where is it?" Richard smiled earnestly.

"I live in Devon, Mr Evans." James replied, "We have means of getting places very fast. But anyway, we should be getting back soon. My parents will be getting home early tomorrow, and they would worry, so really, don't worry. We'll go soon, I just want to make sure he's alright for the journey that's all."

"Alright then" Richard smiled, "stay as long as you need"

"Cheers, Mr Evans" James smiled, heading back over to Sirius. No, he would take him home soon; he didn't want to worry his parents in the morning, nor his house elf, Lexie, who was surely worried out of her mind at her 'masters' sudden departure. Yes, he should probably get back before she got so afraid he came to see how he was. No, it would defiantly be best to go home tonight. No matter how wonderful the Evans' were, James was sure they would not be used to seeing anything as weird and wonderful as a house elf.


End file.
